He reached in his pocket, pulled out a flat leather case, studied it a moment, and then turned it to face her. “Yup, the badge they gave me at the council meeting last night definitely says I’m chief—at least for the next three months. And although my expertise runs more toward fire and rescue, you might as well know I intend to be hands-on in all departments.”
Crap, a bossy boss. “What do you mean by ‘hands-on’?”
“I mean that instead of spending all my time doing paperwork and trying to placate three crews of cocky firefighters and medics, I intend to fight fires and rescue idiots off mountains in the pouring rain like I originally signed up for.”
“If you didn’t want to be chief, then why didn’t you just say no?”
“Because I definitely didn’t sign up to take orders from the next guy in line.”
Katy refrained from asking who that was—partly because she didn’t want to get involved in workplace politics her first day on the job, but mostly because she preferred to form her own opinion of any coworker she might have to trust with her life. “So, does that mean you plan to tag along on ambulance runs?”
His grin widened. “Don’t worry, MacBain; you stay out of burning buildings and I’ll stay out of your bus.” He held out his hand. “Welcome to the team.”
Double crap. Not only was this guy about as grandfatherly as she was, he appeared to be persistent. Katy grabbed his hand for a quick firm shake, only to find herself trapped when he didn’t let go.
“You’re one of five females, Katy,” he said, his tone matching the sudden seriousness in his eyes, “on a squad mostly made up of arrogant, overconfident men who don’t have the words back off in either their professional or personal vocabularies. Anyone gives you any grief, I expect to be the first and only person to hear about it.” His amusement just as suddenly returned. “And by anyone, I’m including your female teammates. Although,” he added dryly, his gaze traveling down the length of her, then back to her eyes, “I’m guessing you can handle anything the women might send your way.”
“I can also handle the men,” she said, giving a small tug on her hand.
His grip remained firm, and his grin vanished again. “But you’re not going to let it reach the point of having to handle anything, are you? Your first hint of trouble brewing, I want you running straight to me instead of those three burly cousins who kindly introduced themselves to all us firefighters last week.”
Ugh. Did she know her family or what? “Did you give this same warning to the other four women?”
He spun on his heel with a rumbling chuckle and strode away, a full two seconds passing before Katy realized her hand was being held by nothing but air. “Go feather your little home away from home with whatever lucky charms and inspirational posters you brought, then meet me at your bus in half an hour.” He stopped inside the open bay door and gestured toward the far end of the station. “That would be the bright yellow and black truck with ambulance written backward on the hood.”
Several more seconds went by with her staring at empty air before Katy took a few slow, deliberate breaths. Although Gunnar Wolfe could probably give bravado lessons to the men temporarily under his command, she really couldn’t take offense at his trying to head off something she now knew could become a major problem.
And just like that, without really understanding why, Katy decided she could trust Chief Wolfe. At least professionally, like when it came to his holding the other end of a rope she might be dangling from halfway down a cliff or trusting his judgment that it was okay to crawl inside a wrecked vehicle to reach a patient.
But outside of work, such as going to the Bottoms Up with the crew for beers after a particularly bad day? Katy unpinned her badge with a snort, stuffed it in her pocket, and headed inside. No, if she ever did find herself in a bar again, she wasn’t even ordering water.
But then she smiled at the realization that came over her: apparently she still had a job.
* * *
* * *
Gunnar wiped off the water he’d splashed on his face and glared into the mirror over the sink in the private quarters behind his new office. Well, that hadn’t gone anywhere near like he’d imagined. “Because you obviously forgot your number one rule of not letting a woman distract you—on or off a mission,” he told the idiot glaring back at him. “Even if she is the mission.”
Only years of surviving by the skin of his teeth had saved him from openly reacting when Katy had jumped up and turned to face him. He’d known she was beautiful; hell, the pictures he’d found of her online had been partly responsible for drawing him here. But no photograph, nothing he’d read about her, nor any of the childhood stories Jane Lakeland had unapologetically used to pique his interest could have prepared him for the flesh and blood woman. Even knowing Katy was six-foot-one, he’d still been stunned to find himself barely having to look down to see the vibrancy in her startled gray eyes.
No, not gray. Those long-lashed, fathomless eyes were the exact color of an Icelandic fogbank backlit by the morning sun. And when she’d spun to him in surprise, the whip of that long single braid of mahogany hair as thick as his wrist had sent him even further back in his youth, to when he would sit on a bluff overlooking the wind-whipped northern Atlantic and dream of escaping his island home on an ancient longship in a bid to conquer the world.
She hadn’t wanted to shake his hand, even though he had enough notches on his bedpost to know women didn’t exactly find him repulsive. And having met her three cousins, Gunnar figured Katy should be comfortable around large men. Hell, her chosen profession practically guaranteed she’d be surrounded by firefighters dwarfed only by their egos.
No, he figured her reluctance, and the skittish energy she emitted, had to do with the last two weeks of her life that he couldn’t account for—or at least hadn’t been able to, so far. Having tracked down the school she’d trained at in Colorado, he’d learned from one of the staff that Katy had surprised everyone by getting falling-down drunk when they’d all gone to a local bar on the last night to celebrate. Before that, no one had seen her have more than an occasional evening glass of wine. The head instructor had personally helped her into the van, taking several of the students to a motel near the small local airport, making sure one of the women promised to see Katy safely to her room.
Only instead of going to the airport the following morning and transferring the rest of her round-trip ticket for one to Shelkova like she’d promised, Katy had stayed at the motel for three days and then simply vanished.
Not that that had stopped Jane from naming her little bundle of joy after her BFF. Gunnar grinned at his reflection, figuring Princess Katherine Maine Lakeland—the first female born to a Lakeland male in twelve generations—was already ruling the palace. Hell, when he’d called two weeks ago to remind Jane how crucial it was, should she hear from Katy, that she not tell her that the guy she’d wanted her to meet was going to Maine to find her instead, Markov had said his lovestruck countrymen were still partying in the streets.
After assuring Jane he’d let her know what had sent her friend into hiding just as soon as he found out why, and after coming up several hundred palm-greasing dollars poorer from digging up more questions than answers in Colorado, Gunnar had reluctantly continued on to Maine to establish himself as one of the firefighters before Katy finally—hopefully—showed up to work. He’d swear it had been the longest two weeks of his life, with him not taking a decent breath until the computer hacker keeping watch texted him night before last, saying Miss MacBain’s cell phone had suddenly started pinging loud and clear in Boise, Idaho.
Gunnar couldn’t for the life of him figure out why the woman had headed north instead of pointing that rental truck east. But he hadn’t been all that surprised when a subsequent text said Miss MacBain placed two calls shortly after turning on her phone—the first one to the country of Shelkova that had lasted thirty
-eight minutes, and a second call to Pine Creek, Maine, lasting exactly seven. Not surprising, given what Jane had shared about Katy’s rather creative rebellions against her overprotective family.
More texts came in throughout yesterday, saying the phone signal kept going off only to start up again in another city. His tech guru finally discovered that Miss MacBain was making her way to Maine by finally using her credit card to buy flights on standby.
Gunnar had known down to the minute when Katy had landed in Bangor, but he hadn’t let himself relax until learning her card had been used at the campground twenty miles south of town—at about the same time the skies opened up and he’d found himself going after an injured hiker, several muddy, treacherous miles away on Fraser Mountain.
With a deep breath, Gunnar decided to cut the poor bastard in the mirror some slack. He had not only run a full gauntlet of emotions these last two weeks—from anger to frustration and finally relief—he would swear he’d felt the ground shift this morning when Katy spun toward him, looking beautiful and vibrant and seemingly fully recovered from whatever in hell sent her running to freaking Idaho.
So okay, then; it appeared he was finally going to find out if the Maine wilderness really produced angels or if he would spend the rest of his life rotting in a palace dungeon for throttling a vengeful, busybody queen. No sooner had that unsettling thought landed than another, more sobering one appeared: with consequences like those on his horizon, his mercenary days might have officially come to an end.
Gunnar let that possibility settle over him, waited for it to stir up his usual “hell no” response. But nothing happened. Well, nothing but another mini mind-earthquake as he once again pictured the magnificent Katy MacBain. Hell YES, his molecules screamed instead, and he realized that locating her had only seemed like the mission.
Chapter Four
Not really into lucky charms or inspirational posters, Katy dumped her overnight bag in the first vacant cubicle she came to in the women’s quarters, then rushed back downstairs to the gorgeous yellow and black, four-wheel drive ambulance.
An angry voice pulled her from her exploration of the equipment in the vehicle—brand-new and cutting edge. She poked her head out of the ambulance and discovered their new chief putting one of the firefighters on notice.
“It’s not your job to educate or reprimand the people we rescue,” Chief Wolfe said.
“Hell with that,” offered the other man. “You don’t take a bunch of inner-city kids into the wilderness without knowing what you’re doing. That guy’s dumbass decision put our squad in danger, sending them out in the middle of a raging storm.”
“I’m aware of the weather conditions,” Chief Wolfe shot back in a tone that seemed more terrifying for its mildness. “That doesn’t change the fact that our job is to help people. Not lecture them for their choices in the middle of a life-and-death situation. You made a tough moment worse. Your job is to make things better. Got it?”
The firefighter gaped for a moment, then seemed to realize he’d have better luck arguing with a rock. “Got it,” he said and walked to his car, muttering to himself.
Rather familiar with men whose level of quietness was a good measure of their anger, Katy decided she would run for cover if Chief Wolfe ever started whispering.
Eventually she emerged from the vehicle, having spent the last half hour getting familiar with the vast array of equipment—some of which she’d only seen in trade magazines. The chief gave her a challenging look, filled with leftover frustration from the argument he’d just had.
Deciding the only way out was through, Katy plunged into the topic that had been nagging at her since her arrival. “Is it a big secret, or can you tell me why Chief Gilmore resigned?” she asked. “When I checked in with him a few weeks ago, he never even alluded to the fact that he was leaving.”
“The official story is he called from Nevada last Thursday,” Chief Wolfe said as he looked in at her through the open back doors, “and told the town manager that he wouldn’t be returning because his wife had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer.”
“Why do you sound like you don’t believe that’s true?”
“I believe his wife really is sick,” he said, gently. He hesitated, as if trying to decide how much to tell her. “But I think the biggest reason Gilmore chose a treatment center clear across the country was because he wanted plenty of real estate between himself and the monster he realized he’d created.”
“Excuse me?”
He grinned, gesturing at all the bays filled with vehicles except for the remote access ambulance, which was out back being washed. “Why do you think every truck in here, from the aerial to the four-wheel drive ambulances, appears to be on steroids?”
“Maybe because they’re working in the mountains, where snow is measured in feet instead of inches?”
“The trucks have to be so large to fit all the oversized egos of the crews.” His expression sobered, and he ran two hands through his hair, stalling again, though Katy couldn’t figure out why. “I wasn’t posturing earlier when I told you to watch your back. These folks have the right to be arrogant, considering everyone’s skill levels, but there are also several adrenaline junkies who consider themselves God’s gift to humanity. And I’m including the women.”
“Which again begs the question of why you agreed to be chief.”
His amusement returned. “Because I’m the worst of the lot.”
Katy had no trouble believing that particular boast, despite having met the man just this morning. If his handling of the citizen complainer hadn’t told her Gunnar Wolfe didn’t suffer fools lightly, what she’d witnessed a few minutes ago had certainly been . . . educating.
“So, how was your course in Colorado?” he asked.
“It was four weeks of adrenaline overload punctuated by moments of sheer terror.”
Her honesty earned her a rumbling chuckle that shot all the way down to her toes. Anxiety washed over her. God help her, for all the years she’d been hoping and praying to meet a man who made every cell in her body shiver, why this one? But even more maddening, what ugly twist of fate had her meeting him now? What kind of cruel God answered a prayer after tearing its owner to shreds, body and soul?
“Just wait until this winter,” he said with lingering amusement, “and the tones go off for an ice climber stuck on—”
He stopped midsentence and went perfectly still, his head canted slightly as he appeared to be listening. “Bring the jump bag,” he said and bolted toward the front of the station.
Crap. Katy ducked back into the ambulance, grabbed the triage bag, and found herself running down the driveway behind two other firefighters also sprinting toward the frantic screams in the distance.
Once they reached the road, she broke into a flat-out run, which had her entering the small park at the base of the sixty-foot waterfall two strides behind the chief—who followed closely behind a large brown dog wearing a ballistic vest and racing toward the panicked little boy standing next to the pool of frothing water.
When they reached him, Katy realized the kid was screaming in a foreign language. He pointed at where the fast-moving stream rushed under the train-trestle-turned-footbridge before spilling into the Bottomless Sea.
Chief Wolfe spoke calmly to the kid in what sounded like the same language just as the dog bolted toward the trestle and plunged into the stream.
“Higgins! Welles!” Chief Wolfe shouted over the roar of the falls as he also ran along the edge of the pool, his gaze locked on the two children clinging to a boulder beyond the car bridge that ran alongside the trestle. “Get below the bridges and be ready to catch them if they’re swept downstream.”
He started emptying his pockets as Katy ran beside him. “Head over with them,” he instructed, handing her his cell phone and wallet. “And bring the boy with you. Dammit, that dog’s going
to make the older kid lose his grip.”
Katy slid to a stop when Chief Wolfe muttered something in yet another unfamiliar language and plunged into the water without breaking stride. Turning to find the five- or six-year-old boy right behind her, she shoved the cell phone and wallet in a side pocket on the jump bag before sliding it on her shoulder, then took hold of the boy’s hand and headed directly up the steep bank.
“Katy,” she said, thumping her chest. “My name is Katy. And don’t you worry,” she went on brightly, hoping her tone would reassure him if he didn’t speak English. “They’ll get your friends.”
Forced to halt after crossing the trestle footpath in order to avoid being trampled by the small stampede of people rushing onto the car bridge to see what was happening, Katy simply scooped up the boy, tucked him under her arm like a football, and sprinted across the road.
“Shep, hold in place!” Niall MacKeage shouted to the dog in what Katy did recognize as Gaelic as he ran up the side lane while also emptying his pockets. He dropped everything on the grassy bank and waded into the water, angling cross-current until he was waist-deep in the stream several yards below the boulder.
Katy gasped, knowing that waist-deep for Niall meant treacherous depth for an average-sized person and that there was likely a drop-off near the rocky falls. She stood her young charge on the ground and crouched down beside him, slipping a protective arm around his waist as she studied the two children on the boulder. In a few seconds, Chief Wolfe reached them. The boy—who looked to be twelve or thirteen—held a younger, unconscious girl against the rock while struggling to keep her head out of the water.
“Nay, Wolfe!” Niall shouted when the chief braced his feet on either side of the children and shoved Shep away. “Have the boy grab Shep’s vest and let the dog tow him to us.” Niall gestured at the two firefighters Wolfe had called Higgins and Welles—one of whom Katy realized was the truck-scrubbing intern—now standing at intervals in the stream between him and shore. “We’ll catch him if he loses his grip.”
Call It Magic Page 5